Fly-fishing anglers employ fine, barely visible lines, or “leaders” between an artificial fly and a much heavier fly line in order to help fool a fish into taking the fly. Leaders have evolved from strands of knotted horsehair back in medieval times, through an era of silkworm gut in the 1800's and early 1900's to the present era of nylon monofilament developed by DuPont in 1938.
Anglers have always had the need to store the leader materials in their tackle bags or vests while on the stream. During the silkworm gut era, leaders were commonly stored in tin boxes which contained dampened felt pads to keep the materials pliable. (See, for example U.S. Pat. No. 2,050,944 to Greggains). Since the development of nylon monofilament, leader materials have almost universally been stored on plastic spools. Anglers generally carry several spools of leader “tippet” materials in different line diameters to match streamside needs.
Having to carry several spools creates issues for the angler. If the spools are all located in one pocket, the angler has to “fish” for the size he wants, typically getting the wrong size at first and having to repeat the process until he gets the right one. If the spools are separated and given a designated spot in a vest pocket or bag, then the angler must, of course, buy and use such a vest or bag. However, unless the angler is very well organized in his life style and goes fishing frequently, he or she will likely forget which pocket contains which size material.
Further, the additional bulk of the angler's gear created by a multiplicity of spools is quite undesirable in view of the typically large number of other accessories he or she carries including fly boxes, fly and fly line floatants, split shot, strike indicators, clippers hemostats, sunglasses, landing net, wading staff, etc.
The angler's issues continue once the correct spool is found. The end of the tippet material is supposed to be readily visible and easy to grasp but this unfortunately is not always the case. The elastic bands on the spools which are used to keep the material from unspooling when not in use often obscure the leader material ends. Finding the end requires removal of the band and searching for the end which is usually concealed among the remaining coils of material. Removal of the elastic band and accessing the leader end sometimes requires a pick-like tool since the width of the spool is too narrow to get a thumb and a finger into the spool to grasp the leader end. If the band is not put back in place a mess of unspooled, troublesome leader material ends often results. Further, bands not restored to the spool are destined to get lost.
One solution to this issue has been offered by some suppliers of tippet material in the form of an elastic band with built-in eyelet through which the tippet end is fed. See, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,792,712 to Houg-Blymer. While this constitutes an improvement, at times the elastic band can be inadvertently rotated on the spool causing the leader end to disappear, making the original problem return.
A further issue with elastic bands is that they are opaque, preventing a view of the remaining amount of material left on the spool. The angler's discovery of an empty tippet spool at a critical time on the stream can be a very upsetting experience.
Attempts at better organization in storing tippet material include U.S. Pat. No. 4,290,223 to Ostenberg et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 7,963,476 to Hemkens et al.; and U.S. Pat. No. 5,490,624 to Yavitz.
All of the above inventions fail to achieve compactness and actually promote the problem of gear bulk by stacking the spools one on top of the other. A thick stack of spools precludes easy insertion into and removal of the spool stack from the vest pocket.
Both Hemkens' and Ostenberg's devices require expensive injection molding for manufacture resulting in either a higher product sell price or unacceptably low profit margin when only small to medium size production quantities are anticipated.
Hemkens' device appears to be more focused on the sales display and marketing aspects of the device rather than on the angler's streamside needs.
Ostenberg's device provides access to the tippet material end for grasping, whereas no similar provision is indicated by Hemkens.
Neither of the above Ostenberg or Hemkens devices provides a means for quickly identifying line sizes in the spool stacks. Only the endmost spools reveal labeling on their side panels.
The issue of fishing vest pocket bulk created by stacked spools has been addressed by inventions for pinning or clipping the spool stack onto the vest or attaching the stack to a neck lanyard. See, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,915,947 to Tomlinson. The stack of spools then dangles free possibly amid other dangling accessories the angler already employs. This creates increased potential for line tangles or fishing gear snags as the angler passes through streamside bushes and trees. Dangling devices inevitably snag on other objects, as well, and often get lost. All gear is ideally stored inside pockets to preclude loss and snagging of gear.
These and other solutions to the problem of leader tippet storage are predicated on a very questionable premise, namely, that the leader necessarily has to be stored on spools. The belief underlying this premise is that the leader must be straight when it is removed from the storage device, be it a spool or other device. U.S. Pat. No. 4,290,233 to Ostenberg et al. illustrates this point through the incorporation of a mechanism for uncurling the leader as it comes off the spool. Contrary to this view are the following facts:                (a) Modern day tippet materials are much softer and more supple than those of years ago and therefore exhibit much less leader memory, the characteristic that results in curling and kinking.        (b) Residual curls or kinks in the material after removal from the storage device are of no consequence in streamer, wet fly or nymph fishing since the weight of the fly and terminal rig combined with the force of the stream current remove any memory-induced slack from the leader.        (c) Curling and kinking naturally disappear when the leader is in use. (This is not true of the “pig tailing” issue that exists in the material near the knotted fly but this is an issue independent of leader storage device.)        (d) A non-straight leader is actually highly desirable for presentation of the fly in dry fly fishing so as to avoid any trace of cross-current drag in presentation of the fly, as taught by the renown fly-fishing expert, George Harvey, long time professor of fly-fishing at Penn State University.        (e) Commercially available leader straighteners are available for those who nonetheless insist on fishing with straight leaders.        (f) Curls or kinks in the leader can be largely removed by simply pulling the leader taut with the hands as when snugging up the knot after tying on a fly or tying two tippet pieces together.        
Other leader storage systems achieve compactness by foregoing spools, and instead, store the leaders on thin, card-like devices.
The device of U.S. Pat. No. 3,785,080 to Wallace is intended for storage of both leader terminal hardware and leader as a unit. It is slim, compact, and has dedicated storage space for four different leader materials in ample quantities, and, desirably, provides visibility of remaining amounts of material. However, the leader retention method, slotted pegs inserted into holes in the board compromise the inherent compactness of the board by jutting out of the surface thereby impeding insertion into and removal from a pocket. Further, the pegs being non-captive to the board are prone to loss. A further very important disadvantage is that if the device is used without hooks or swivels, as it would be for fly-fishing tippet materials, then there is no means provided to quickly and easily grasp the tippet material ends. The tippet material would lie flush with the surface of the board making it extremely difficult to grasp without a pick-like tool. In addition no means is provided for identifying the various leader sizes held on the card.
Other card-like leader storage devices include U.S. Pat. No. 966,609 to Shannon and U.S. Pat. No. 2,663,114 to Warner. Shannon's device satisfies the need for slimness and compactness but works only for leaders with hooks attached and therefore is unsatisfactory for the storage of leader tippet material. Warner's device is also compact and card-like. It can store leader materials without hooks, swivels or other hardware attached. It embodies, slimness and compactness but lacks the fundamental attribute, however, of being able to neatly store large amounts of leader material of different sizes in a neat, compartmentalized manner. It is not streamlined for easy, snag-free insertion into and removal from a pocket.
None of the devices described in the above referenced patents possesses all of the features of the ideal, leader tippet storage device, namely:                (1) slim, compact size for slipping easily into and out of a shirt or vest pocket        (2) storage of four or more leader tippet sizes on a single device, each with its own dedicated area for storage        (3) tippet material lengths equal to or greater than current tippet spools (30 m)        (4) labeling which allows unambiguous, quick identification of leader tippet sizes        (5) quick and easy finding and grasping of leader tippet ends        (6) easy tippet material removal and length measuring capability        (7) secure retention of tippet ends to prevent unraveling when not in use        (8) readily changeable size labels        (9) complete visibility of the amounts of tippet material remaining in all sizes        (10) capability to firmly secure the ends of very fine tippet materials, e.g. 7×        (11) simplicity in design and low cost in manufacture        